The sudden killings of six American service members on a foot patrol by a suicide bomber this week is a graphic message back home that the Taliban are durable, able to launch a number of coordinated attacks in recent months across Afghanistan 14 years after the U.S. invasion.

A Pentagon report calls the security situation “fragile” and writes of the Taliban’s “resilience throughout the second half of the year.”

Perhaps they are unaware of our superior technology? Or perhaps we simply aren't trying hard enough. Here is the thing. If you can't win in nearly four times the amount of time it took to force both Japan and Nazi Germany to surrender, you can't win, period.

So stop already. Declare victory if you must, even if no one will believe it. But stop!

I remember reading a comment by Sir Walter Scott from the 1830s about Afghanistan, to the effect that it was the Scottish Highlands without the kilts. The same sort of clan system, the same sort of clan warfare.

If you take a look at it, the British only pacified the Highlanders through military defeat (at Culloden) followed by occupation, disarmament, shattering of clan authority, partial depopulation, and partial de-culturation. The only reason the British bothered was the Jacobite threat.

I have long thought that the United States got overambitious in both Afghanistan and Iraq. Sometimes, you have to settle for just containing the barbarians, not civilizing them.

1. Set up a democracy.2. Encourage their women to vote.3. End of story.

In a generation, abortion will be commonplace. They will harvest their babies for parts. The birthrate will plummet, and their women will become obese, tattooed sluts, who get most government jobs, with excessive benefits, and a large EITC once a year.

Their men will be emasculated SJW pussies, crushed by child support and public shaming.

Won't need to conquer them. Just sell them poisonous processed food, and watch them slowly circle the drain.

Given the reasons why the Americans were likely in the middle of this mob and not at the periphery, it then logically follows that the Afghans at the outer edge of the formation would have to have seen some person sitting on a motorcycle. If he just sat there and idled, he would be noticed. If he charged in at high speed, he would be noticed and heard. It is the responsibility of the patrol members, ALL patrol members, to act as eyes and ears for the unit as a whole. In this, the Afghanis failed. There may be reasons for the failure, such as lack of clear rules of engagement, to outright collusion with the enemy. No matter, as Americans are now dead because of it.

Why didn't any Afghan see that potential bomber on the motorcycle?There is a big difference between the number of both soldiers and police recorded as on duty, and the real number," he said, saying the official record was stuffed with "ghost police and soldiers. - Ibid.Because they didn't exist - but they were paid, that's why!Your tax dollars at work folks!

We went to Afghanistan because Al Quaeda was using it as a base of operations. We inflicted serious damage, took out the Taliban...then got bit by the nation-building bug.

The problem being that Afghanistan doesn't have a strong national identity. Their loyalties are tribal. It's Vox's Thousand Years To Civilization theory...and even if you disagree with the timescale, the principle that civilizing a people takes several generations holds true.

COULD the Afghans be civilized? Sure, but it will take at least 75 years, more likely 100. And a heavy hand in the meantime. Can the United States do it? No. Historically, we have a fairly hard limit of 36 months on military activity. Americans will fight like lions for three years, but then demand to see either a victory in sight or a disengagement being attempted.

In Germany and Japan we started with literate, industrial societies and then we dictated terms of surrender and supervised their redevelopment with confidence in capitalism and representative democracy.

In Afghanistan we have illiterate villagers who follow Islam. We did not attempt to change them, for we lacked confidence in the superiority of capitalism, democracy and Christ. Based on who the West is and who these people are, we wouldnt have gotten far anyway.

Further, the feminized, lead from behind, ignore the situation on the ground approach to occupation in Iraq and Afghanistan was doomed to failure in masculine, confident Islamic states.

To win a war, the loser must know that he has lost and is thoroughly subjugated. That never happened in Iraq or Afghanistan.

We used to win wars. We don't win anymore because we have had PC pussies in the White House. We won World War 2 because we didn't care about collateral damage, we didn't have PC, we didn't have rules of engagement and we didn't have soldiers worried about being court martialed for doing their job. When you go to war victory is the goal meaning you do whatever it takes to win and let God sort the rest of it out.

They don't want to defeat the Taliban. They want the perpetual threat to exist, to give them an excuse to keep troops in the area for their much-desired war against Iran, and against anyone else that Israel hallucinates to be a threat to their hegemony.

This is not entirely accurate. Al Queda was present in Afghanistan prior to the invasion. Bin Laden (the ideological arm of Al Queda) was most definitely using the mountains as a hideout with the intent of luring the U.S. into a protracted fight in the mountains. We would have easily been able to declare victory in Afghanistan after Tora Bora; but, Bush had to try and democratize them, and rebuild them in our image.

The problem is, the Taliban wants nothing to do with democracy, and could be more closely associated with a mafia that doubles as a government. Women voting would have no effect on the Taliban because the Taliban rules with force in every valley in Afghanistan. Afghan's pay excise taxes to the Taliban because the Taliban controls the entrances to the valleys. Afghanistan is a disaster due to the terrain, Bin Laden knew it and we fell for his bait. Well played sir, well played.

Yesterday, the National Enquirer released a story entitled, "Muslim Obama’s White House Infested With Terrorist Spies!". Also, there's been a slew of very recent MSM stories about illegal aliens being deported.

This is interesting, because it deviates from the standard narrative. Remember, the National Enquirer broke the John Edwards scandal a few years back, so they're not all about aliens and what-not.

Combined, these two developments make me wonder, what has changed? Are they a blip on the radar? Or the beginning of a new narrative? If so, what does this mean? Anything?

@27. dc.sunsets:We went to Afghanistan because Al Quaeda was using it as a base of operations.

Not until after the USA invasion did al queda get going there.That was Iraq. There actually was Al-Queda in Afghanistan prior to us.We demanded the Taliban turn Bin Laden and the senior Al-Queda over to us, the Taliban told us to get bent. We went in, likely not that long after Bin Laden fled to Pakistan.

If only the liberals could figure out how to destroy other countries rather than their own.Sad to think this is sort of what happened to the U.S. Between European communists fleeing WW2 and Soviet-backed agitators throwing gasoline on race relations, this strategy has a proven track record. I just wish it hadn't been used against us.

You snidely claim that nothing the news media does not admit to is true. They are your arbiter. What if the media later admits that some of those things are true? Does your whole world come crashing down?

People who believe the CNN/USAtoday/CBS/ABC/NBC/PBS version of the news make me chuckle.

Know how to identify a cuckservative? He still thinks that his geopolitical news feed is honest, even though he knows that the same sources promote little beyond propaganda when the subject is political economy.

Opium, pipelines, a treasure trove of mineral deposits, and airbases next door to Israel's arch enemy.

Japan and Germany were advanced, industrial, civilized societies that were brought to heel by bombing them into the Stone Age. Millions of their people were dead, starving, or on the edge of starvation. Its easy to control civilized people brought low to such conditions. Afghanistan can't be bomb into the Stone Age because it already there. Iraq was much more modern in comparison and, boy, did we do a number on them. Although its hard to say yet if all that bombing, torture, and DU poisoning has completely broken them.

@Chris Mallory the SJW cultural blinders worn by those who are now making the decisions on Afghani policy refuse to accept that other cultures aren't so accepting of their world view. The female Major was an out there, in-your-face SJW "first openly gay" harridan. It makes perfect sense that they (our SJW Overlords) would deploy her outside the wire for propaganda purposes and photo ops of her interacting with the local females. Their arrogance belies the reality that her mere existence there was viewed as a huge insult to the men that run the local tribes. The rumor is also that trips outside the wire are necessary to justify writeups for all kinds of medals, awards, citations, media congratulatory writeups and kudos that fuel the SJW engine, and far too many pointy-tip-of-the-spears types are diverted from real missions to supporting exactly these types of planted and planned propaganda sojourns. Paper credentials over actual competence is what is highly valued in their (SJW) culture. I for one will be watching to see what types of write-ups and revisionist history follows in the wake of her death, including a possible posthumous promotion.

My Air Force service was many many years ago,back before the security field and the law enforcement fields were combined, but I never saw an OSI major outside his office. Lieutenants, Captains and sometimes Colonels might make it into the field, but Majors were always lost in admin. I could see the security forces being on a foot patrol, but not OSI.

GWOT is a joke, I called that back in September of 2001. I predicted exactly what would happen, the idiot neo-cons would march their conservative morons off to war and leave the neo-cons' multiculturalist allies in power in this country and the war would end up right back at our doorsteps.

"So smartass what would you have done differently?" First order of business promote Kratman to general grade and issue him orders to crucify the multi-cultis till they are utterly defeated or dead. Then the wars of punitive retribution or annihilation can be waged.

1) Vox is right. Japan had been trying for months to surrender, and were going through the Swiss to do so. The US would not accept the Japanese terms of surrender which were to keep the Emperor in power and to keep the military (security forces) intact (as Sun Tzu preaches). The bombs were unnecessary. Only Le May, that I know of, approved of the bombs being dropped. All of the other heads were against it. Coincidentally, We gave the Japanese pretty much what they wanteed in the surrender terms. But I beleive that was because MacArthur knew the culture and what was needed to keep the peace.

As for Afghanistan. The Taliban did not tell Bush to take a hike. Bush would not accept the Taliban's terms to turn over Bin Laden, which were: 1) show us the evidence he was responsible for this attack; 2) we want him tried in a Muslim court according to Sharia law; and 3) where he is tried must be determined by the Arab league. The Taliban, at least had OBL in check in Afghanistan, and under house arrest.

#1 might have been a reasonable request, but #2 and #3 are completely non-serious. I'd put at 50/50 that the Taliban knew that, and were intentionally being seriously non-serious, vs really via their Muslim solipsism had no idea that the US would find "must be tried in a Sharia court" rightly laughable.

The SJWs have a deep emotional commitment to ruling America, and old and bitter grudges against Americans who don't belong to their in-group. None of that applies in Afghanistan. In fact, they regard the Taliban as natural allies against their real enemies.

I wouldn't bet on their behavior in Afghanistan being any guide at all.

The only way to "win" in Afghanistan is to kill everyone there, and there's no will for that. Time to go, then.

This is actually good news.

It means that if social mood keeps pinning the needle and the cultural Marxists remain in power, maybe they won't try to murder every last soul who won't accept their program.

Up until now I've wondered.

WRONG! The Cultural Marxists won't touch the Taliban because they are their mutual ally against Christendom and Western Civilization. They will be more than happy to cart Christians by the bucketloads to the gulags and Zyklon B showers if they are ever given the chance...

Ideologically, the Soviet leadership was unable to come to grips with war in Afghanistan. Marxist-Leninist dogma did not allow for a "war of national liberation" where people would fight against a Marxist regime.

Bush neglected to learn the lessons the Red Army learned. The average Afghan only cares about his clan and does what the cheif guy says. He doesn't care about the dictatorship of the proletariat nor in the liberties of Western Liberal Democracy. He just wants to pray towards Mecca, rob a few neighboring clans, then beat his wife, and make love to his cattle or vice versa.

Why should they? The Japanese bombed a US Naval base without a declaration of war, they were extraordinarily brutal to the US POWs and civilian populations that they controlled, and the US was in a decisive winning position. Only a putz would have accepted surrender terms under those conditions.

The US did commit a moral crime involving the Japanese surrender, but it wasn't the atom bombs. There is nothing morally unusual about atom bombs. Bombers had razed many cities during the war already, and artillery had been razing cities for centuries.

The moral crime that the US committed was in not having a war crimes tribunal and shooting all the Japanese commanders who planned Pearl Harbor and ran the prison camps and committed atrocities against civilians. A lot of American POWs that gave everything for their country, never saw their country honor their sacrifice by giving them justice.

You have to wonder why a female Air Force OSI Major and at least 3 other OSI NCOs were on a security patrol on foot.

She was a major in your face bull dyke and heard that STR8 White Church Going Christian men found their safe space to talk about moslems and dkyes out side the wire. "Major Carpet Licker the STR8WCGCM have found a "safe space" to defeat the narrative over at the intersection of Rapeher Alley & Seventytwovirgin Street"

Hardly, as any number of passages from Kipling or Churchill would attest to. Interestingly, the latter in his early work The Story of the Malakand Field Force describes in passing one of the first technology advances that would eventually give the Western world the ability to far surpass what the Afghans could do (if only the West were willing): the heliograph. With it the expeditionary forces, as well as the small garrisons placed at strategic points along some of the routes of travel, could have same-day round trip telegraphic communications with the Raj officials in Calcutta*.

Looking at our modern scenario, the initial US response in Afghanistan combined the latest such advances (e.g. radio communications plus air-dropped pgm's) with local forces in a very effective way. Imagine the Siege of Kabul if the Brits had been able to send a flight of Vulcans (or, heck, even a few Mosquitos) to assist.

All that matters is that they were the govt of a sovereign nation and their requests were reasonable and lawful. If you want to extradite someone, you have to yield to the demands of the country who is holding the person. You can speculate all you want, but the only reason we ignored them is because of American exceptionalism.

Mind you. This is the same Taliban that after the US Embassy attacks in Tanzania and Kenya, contacted the US embassy in Islamabad to see if the they had any evidence pinning those attacks on OBL. They wanted to try him, but given that their was not enough evidence, they could not. They did not like OBL being in Afghanistan. They figured he was nothing but trouble. We chased him there. He was a hero to the people there. They just couldn't hand him over, especially with no evidence.

It all boils down to this: serious or not, they had every right to make that request, and our refusal to provide proof, and agree to the latter two terms, has led to an undeclared war, thousands dead, and both countries worse off for it. ...because we thought we were exceptional.

(* that instant communication was by no means an unmixed blessing, as a great part of the strength of the British Empire was local officials being able to exercise their judgement w/o too much micromanaging from above. But in the case of a siege, the ability to let the rest of the force know what was happening was still a force multiplier.)

The "myth", not the reality...that legend did get puffed up after the Soviets allowed themselves to be picked by those goat-herding pederasts. The British Empire, I think had more of the requisite will than the Soviets, but lacked the force multipliers.

War propaganda. In reality, Japan didn't do anything different than what the European Powers did in Asia and Africa for centuries. It paled in comparison to what The Crown did to the Boer and Leopold did to the Congo only a few years before. In fact, Japan had more right to fight in Manchuria: next door, vital to its economy, and under Communist threat, than did the US had in Vietnam. Its also a well known established fact that, like Germany, Japan did not want a war with the US and was goaded into a non-surprise attack on Pearl Harbor.

#71 jaime, he actual content of the terms was not the issue. The issue was whether Japan was in a position to demand anything or had been totally defeated. It was important for the United States to convince Japan that they had been totally defeated to make sure they wouldn't be back in twenty years.

@75: "War propaganda. In reality, Japan didn't do anything different than what the European Powers did in Asia and Africa for centuries. It paled in comparison to what The Crown did to the Boer and Leopold did to the Congo only a few years before."

Oh, I see. Since A got away with murder and B got away with murder and C got away with murder, we should let D get away with murder to, otherwise, where's the fairness?

Im sorry, when did the European powers bomb American naval bases without a formal declaration of war?

Because you said everything in comment #61 was just war propaganda and that European countries had done worse in the congo, so Im assuming there was an American naval base in the congo that was attacked by the Europeans otherwise you would have been making a totally irrelevent comparison.

Actually, the Taliban asked the Bush administration if it had proof that bin Laden was behind the attacks saying it would turn him over if it did. Any government would have done the same. Bush ignored the request and attacked.

It seems to me in the part you quoted he was saying that Western Holier than thou attitudes are not warranted.

That is my point. I would add this attitude was exploited by the FDR Regime to goad the American people into a war they did not want and the war FDR hypocritically ran against in 1940.

The mistake he makes is in proclaiming that Japan was goaded into an attack. On what evidence does he make that claim?

I provided a link to Day of Deceit by Robert Stinnett, one of the better books on how the FDR Regime setup the Pearl Harbor attack. It documents reams of evidence of FDR's perfidy, most of it coming from the official Army and Navy inquiries into event. There are also many other books and tons of material available on the internet. If an adult in this day and age still believes the official fairy tales about Pearl Harbor or the rest of WWII then they should be not be considered an informed person. Quite frankly, it would be the same as believing in Santa Claus or the Easter Bunny.

Only the Chinese can do it, and it will have to be done by pre-modern methods. That is, a large army of several million unmarried men must invade human-wave-style, kill all the males, and mate with the females. Otherwise, Afghanistan is indeed unconquerable.

Someone else has probably already said this, but, if the West were willing to do to Afghanistan what it did to Germany and Japan then we would of course win.

But why would we do that? They're not as big a threat, and they don't have anything worth taking (correct me if I'm wrong).

As for Britain in the 19th c., it was a proxy war with Russia. The aim wasn't to defeat the Afghan tribes permanently and hold onto their territory, because that would've put British India directly on Russia's border. Too much potential for serious (and expensive) conflict. Afghanistan was a buffer zone, and a relatively neutral one at that. It just came at the cost of occasionally having to wade in give the Afghans a slapping.

Again, correct me if I'm wrong - and I'm probably wrong

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